Speaker 1: Hi everyone, Andre here, I have some exciting news to share.
Speaker 1: ABC has turned Betrayal Weekly into an eight episode anthology,
Speaker 1: which means each episode features one of your favorite Betrayal
Speaker 1: Weekly stories. You'll get to see the people involved, hear
Speaker 1: from people who have never spoken before, and actually see
Speaker 1: where the story took place. We are so proud and
Speaker 1: excited to share it with you all. It's called Betrayal,
Speaker 1: Secrets and Lies, and you can watch it every Sunday
Speaker 1: at ten pm Eastern Standard time, nine pm Central. Please
Speaker 1: check it out. There is a corner of the criminal
Speaker 1: justice system that you won't find on court documents. It
Speaker 1: doesn't involve judges, prosecutors, juries, it doesn't even involve laws. Really.
Speaker 1: It's called prison consulting. You might have heard about it
Speaker 1: on the news. Harvey Weinstein is preparing for prison.
Speaker 2: He recently hired a consultant who is helping guide him
Speaker 2: on what to expect.
Speaker 3: Bernie Madoff has hired a prison consultant.
Speaker 4: Actress Lori Laughlin has reportedly hired a prison consultant.
Speaker 1: Luigi man Joni Martha Stewart. NFL player Michael Vick has
Speaker 1: hired a prison consultant. Willis new prison consultant tip the
Speaker 1: scales in his case. Prison consultants assist people who are
Speaker 1: facing time. Many of these consultants promote their services on
Speaker 1: YouTube and TikTok.
Speaker 5: Have you been indicted?
Speaker 6: You think you're gonna be indicted? You need someone who
Speaker 6: speaks inmates and institutions.
Speaker 7: So if you are a.
Speaker 8: Loved one that's been recently arrested, you can go ahead
Speaker 8: and text me.
Speaker 7: I'll be happy to help you in any.
Speaker 1: Way I can for the right price. Prison consultants will
Speaker 1: advise those facing time on how to get a lesser
Speaker 1: sentence or how to get out of jail early. They'll
Speaker 1: tell you what programs to join and what gangs to avoid.
Speaker 1: Many of these consultants have served time themselves, often for
Speaker 1: fine antil crimes or nonviolent offenses. But what if the
Speaker 1: person giving out that advice was a convicted rapist? What
Speaker 1: if they were someone like Mike Levengood. I'm Andre Gunning
Speaker 1: and this is Betrayal, Season five, Episode nine, Rehabilitation. For Saskia,
Speaker 1: this crime didn't just take an emotional toll. It devastated
Speaker 1: her financially, especially when it came to paying for her divorce.
Speaker 9: I'd always learned you'd never touch your four O one K,
Speaker 9: like you always need three months of bills in the
Speaker 9: bank just in case a rainy day, and I'd always
Speaker 9: live by that. And I had to kind of throw
Speaker 9: that out the window to fight this. I remember the
Speaker 9: first withdrawal I made was for sixty ten thousand dollars
Speaker 9: and that was just for attorney's bills up to that point.
Speaker 1: In the end, the divorce cost her about one hundred
Speaker 1: thousand dollars. It's a financial hole she's still crawling out of.
Speaker 1: All of this got us thinking about Mike's financial status,
Speaker 1: how he's doing today after this crime. So we did
Speaker 1: some digging and what we found surprised us. By early
Speaker 1: twenty twenty one, Mike had served his sentence. He was
Speaker 1: released from jail and put on probation. One of the
Speaker 1: many standard conditions of probation is getting a job, and
Speaker 1: for Mike that wouldn't be easy, not only because of
Speaker 1: his conviction, but because of his resume.
Speaker 9: He was very smart yet a master's degree. He was
Speaker 9: working as vice president of marketing for Bank of America,
Speaker 9: So I mean he made a good salary.
Speaker 1: It was more than a good salary. Before his conviction,
Speaker 1: he was making between two hundred and two hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty thousand dollars a year. He was an executive, and
Speaker 1: a good one. If you look at his LinkedIn recommendations,
Speaker 1: he was well liked and respected. One recommendation reads.
Speaker 10: He's not only a tremendous professional, he's also a person
Speaker 10: of integrity, kindness, and old school values.
Speaker 1: While another says Mike is a top notch professional and
Speaker 1: a pleasure to work with. Even during his sentencing hearing
Speaker 1: and after pleading guilty to second degree rape, a former
Speaker 1: colleague showed up to defend him.
Speaker 7: As long as I've learned Mike, he's really always been
Speaker 7: an outstanding character of people, grow mentoring, providing kindness, and
Speaker 7: a good will towards people.
Speaker 3: Nice is the jumble soul.
Speaker 1: It's one of the hardest things to wrap your head
Speaker 1: around the fact that someone can commit a disturbing personal
Speaker 1: crime and people will still line up to call them
Speaker 1: kind and gentle. Most sex offenders struggle to find any
Speaker 1: work after they get out. When they do, it's usually construction,
Speaker 1: waste management, or warehouse gigs. But Mike had a plan.
Speaker 1: In fact, he had it before he went to jail.
Speaker 1: During his sentencing hearing back in twenty nineteen, his lawyer
Speaker 1: shared that plan with the judge.
Speaker 3: He has started an LLC so that he can provide
Speaker 3: consulting to businesses using the information and knowledge that he
Speaker 3: had from his career, and hopefully not let the record
Speaker 3: be an impediment to some companies hiring him. Because he
Speaker 3: can use the LLC, he'd use.
Speaker 1: His expertise in banking and marketing to support himself financially,
Speaker 1: and by running that business through an LLC, his clients
Speaker 1: could work with him without the bad pr Then, in
Speaker 1: February of twenty twenty one, out of jail, and a
Speaker 1: month later he filed a trade name application for a
Speaker 1: new company. But this company wasn't a business consulting firm.
Speaker 1: It was Smith and Good Associates. According to their legal
Speaker 1: business filing, Smith and Good is a consulting firm for
Speaker 1: individuals in the criminal justice system, which is just another
Speaker 1: way of saying prison consultants. We wanted to learn what
Speaker 1: this industry was all about, so we called up an expert.
Speaker 5: My name is John Fuller. I started my prison consulting
Speaker 5: business in two thousand and four.
Speaker 1: Like a lot of prison consultants, John has a criminal past.
Speaker 5: That since the ten years for conspiracy to possess with
Speaker 5: intent to distribute.
Speaker 1: He did time for drug and forgery charges. But since prison,
Speaker 1: John's built quite the career for himself.
Speaker 5: I've worked primarily with white collar criminals, professional athletes, entertainers,
Speaker 5: mostly high profile individuals.
Speaker 1: Multiple outlets say he coached Martha Stewart when she was
Speaker 1: heading to prison. He didn't comment on that. But no
Speaker 1: matter the client, his job is essentially the same.
Speaker 5: I prepare my clients on things that they should do
Speaker 5: before incarceration, ways they should behave during incarceration, and any
Speaker 5: assistance or the reality of their circumstances post incarceration.
Speaker 1: Every prison consultant offers different services. Some explain sentencing guidelines
Speaker 1: or strategized on getting their clients' lesser sentences. They facilitate
Speaker 1: mock trials and in some cases assist in writing remorse
Speaker 1: letters to victims. Others focus on eliminating the unknowns of prison,
Speaker 1: what the foods the fellow inmates might be like, and
Speaker 1: they also explain those unknowns to family members who are
Speaker 1: scared for their loved one. But John is the first
Speaker 1: to admit there are a lot of unethical people in
Speaker 1: his industry.
Speaker 6: What ninety percentities of the prison consultants are doing. They'll
Speaker 6: make promises and tell you that they can save your life.
Speaker 1: In our reporting, we spoke to several prison consultants. Every
Speaker 1: one of them had something to say about the others.
Speaker 1: But John brought up a lot of interesting examples of
Speaker 1: how other consultants will say they can gain the system
Speaker 1: to their client's advantage.
Speaker 5: For instance, they'll lie and charge you fifteen twenty thousand
Speaker 5: dollars and tell you as soon as you get to
Speaker 5: the prison they can get them in a residential drug
Speaker 5: and alcohol program.
Speaker 1: You might be wondering, why would anyone who doesn't use
Speaker 1: drugs or alcohol pay twenty thousand dollars for addiction treatment. Well,
Speaker 1: John says can be part of a larger strategy.
Speaker 6: Because if you can get into the residential drug and
Speaker 6: alcohol program, you can get eighteen months to three years
Speaker 6: off your sentence.
Speaker 5: So of course they're gonna go that route.
Speaker 6: And this wise guy of a prison consultant says, we're
Speaker 6: gonna lie and you're gonna tell your probation officer that
Speaker 6: you do use drugs. You do use alcohol as a
Speaker 6: matter of fact, go report next week with the smell
Speaker 6: of alcohol on your breath and that's what's gonna qualify
Speaker 6: you for the residential drug and alcohol program.
Speaker 1: A few years ago, a prison consultant pled guilty to
Speaker 1: conspiring to defraud the Federal Bureau of Prisons for running
Speaker 1: that exact scam. But John says that's not the only
Speaker 1: scam people in his industry are operating.
Speaker 6: These prison consultants are literally stealing money from people, saying,
Speaker 6: you're not gonna do any time, but if you don't
Speaker 6: pay me this ten fifteen, twenty twenty five thousand dollars
Speaker 6: within the next thirty six hours, I can't help you.
Speaker 6: And the client is so scared that he's going to
Speaker 6: do it.
Speaker 1: Mike declined our requests for comment, so we don't know
Speaker 1: how much Smith and Good charges or the specific strategies
Speaker 1: they use, but on their website they do advertise a
Speaker 1: wide variety of services. They support clients in mitigating their
Speaker 1: sentences and prepping for their time behind bars. They also
Speaker 1: provide guidance on parole hearings and sex offender registry requirements.
Speaker 1: But there's one line that stands out to me on
Speaker 1: the Smith in Good homepage. I had my producer Trey
Speaker 1: read it.
Speaker 10: We emphasize the importance of rehabilitation, how to do this
Speaker 10: safely at the Department of Corrections, and what loved ones
Speaker 10: can do to support rehabilitative efforts. It also with a plan.
Speaker 1: It's not for us to say whether Mike was rehabilitated
Speaker 1: while behind bars, but we can say that Mike had
Speaker 1: a plan for himself. Very soon after Mike got out
Speaker 1: of jail, he had a business name, address, and tax
Speaker 1: id number, and on top of that, he found himself
Speaker 1: a business partner. His associate is a former army ranger
Speaker 1: with a criminal pass of his own. But unlike Mike,
Speaker 1: he wasn't a sex offender. He was charged with murder,
Speaker 1: and when questioned by detectives, his story changed three times.
Speaker 1: In twenty twenty one, Saska's ex husband, Mike Levin Goood,
Speaker 1: started a prison consulting firm, Smith and Good Associates. He
Speaker 1: was the Good in the business name, as in Levin Goood,
Speaker 1: and the Smith was Gary James Smith. Gary has experience
Speaker 1: with the system too, but his journey is a lot
Speaker 1: more complicated. We're going to take a detour into Gary's
Speaker 1: story because it brings up some very important questions about
Speaker 1: the kind of business Mike is operating in two thousand
Speaker 1: and six. Gary was a young veteran, an Army ranger
Speaker 1: fresh out of the military. As a judge said of
Speaker 1: him at trial, there.
Speaker 8: Are many examples in mister Smith's life where he was
Speaker 8: a good person. He was a mentor to young soldiers.
Speaker 8: He was promoted the rank of sergeant fairly quickly, which
Speaker 8: is no easy tax. He was assigned to a very
Speaker 8: responsible unit with a very important job in the defense
Speaker 8: of this country. But when good people do bad things,
Speaker 8: they have to be held accountable. He made a horribly
Speaker 8: bad decision, and in making that decision, it crossed the
Speaker 8: life of another young man.
Speaker 1: That young man was twenty two year old Michael McQueen.
Speaker 1: He was also an Army ranger an intelligence analyst. He
Speaker 1: and Gary served several tours together in Afghanistan. When they
Speaker 1: came back to the US, they moved in together. The
Speaker 1: queen's friends and family said he was excited to be home.
Speaker 1: He had plans to go to college, then law school,
Speaker 1: become a sports agent. But then in the early morning
Speaker 1: hours of September twenty six, two thousand and six, Michael
Speaker 1: McQueen was found dead. He had a gunshot wound to
Speaker 1: the head. His roommate, Gary Smith, was the one to
Speaker 1: call nine one one. You're about to hear that call.
Speaker 9: In it.
Speaker 1: Gary is distraught. The nine one one operator could barely
Speaker 1: understand him. If you'd like, you can skip ahead thirty seconds.
Speaker 11: What's the problem there.
Speaker 1: When the cops arrived, Gary remained inconsolable. He insisted he
Speaker 1: had nothing to do with McQueen's death, but the police
Speaker 1: they didn't buy it because Gary was covered in McQueen's
Speaker 1: blood and that wasn't all. Here's the prosecutor a trial's.
Speaker 4: Outside at this point, over the top, uncontrollably crying and
Speaker 4: they were officers. Well, Sargeant said, I know she was
Speaker 4: crying loudly, but there.
Speaker 3: Were no tears coming.
Speaker 1: And each time the authorities pressed Gary, he changed his story.
Speaker 1: During the investigation, he gave three very different versions of
Speaker 1: what happened that night. Story number one came the first
Speaker 1: time the police asked Gary what happened. He said he
Speaker 1: wasn't even home at the time of McQueen's death. They'd
Speaker 1: been out drinking and Gary dropped McQueen at their apartment
Speaker 1: before running out for a quick errant. Here's Gary on
Speaker 1: the police interrogation tapes.
Speaker 11: He went upstairs.
Speaker 3: I said, I to go pick up some queen socks.
Speaker 12: I drove over my mother's house, crabt the logic, bask
Speaker 12: good for clothes. Put him in my car. Turning about
Speaker 12: it went back to the house that went stared open
Speaker 12: the door. I saw Mike sitting in a chair, and
Speaker 12: I saw blood up over the place.
Speaker 1: Maybe it was a suicide, or maybe someone killed McQueen.
Speaker 1: Gary offered a few possible theories of who could have
Speaker 1: done it, some neighbors McQueen had argued with, or maybe
Speaker 1: a drug dealer in the building. Gary said when he
Speaker 1: found McQueen, there were no weapons nearby. He kept all
Speaker 1: of his guns at his mom's house, but later he
Speaker 1: told officers something very different. Here's story number two.
Speaker 7: I came home. Michael was dead, gumbles in his hands.
Speaker 1: It was Gary's gun. He knew his fingerprints would be
Speaker 1: all over it. Anti panicked, going best.
Speaker 12: I realized he was dead. I got back to my car.
Speaker 12: I drove to la and Evily and I threw here
Speaker 12: I need to preach. I got back from my car.
Speaker 12: I drew back to my house.
Speaker 1: Gary confessed that before calling nine to one one, he
Speaker 1: took the time to get rid of the weapon. He said,
Speaker 1: he threw the gun in a lake.
Speaker 2: I was so scared he was dead.
Speaker 7: He was dead, and it was mind ol.
Speaker 5: I left that gun there.
Speaker 11: It was my going.
Speaker 7: I didn't pop it up.
Speaker 1: Now Gary was suddenly sure this had to be a suicide.
Speaker 1: And then there was story number three, also a suicide.
Speaker 1: But in this third account, Gary didn't come home to
Speaker 1: find McQueen dead. He was in the apartment when McQueen
Speaker 1: fired the gun. The prosecutor summarized this version for the court.
Speaker 4: Says, he comes in, he puts a gun on the floor,
Speaker 4: he was back in the bathroom, who came out, and
Speaker 4: Mike killed himself. And then even of story three, he
Speaker 4: gives different versions of that I put on the table,
Speaker 4: I was here, I did see it, I didn't see it.
Speaker 4: I might have been closed, I might not have been closed.
Speaker 1: Three different stories and one dead man. And with each version,
Speaker 1: Gary moved a little closer to the scene, from nowhere
Speaker 1: near the apartment and no gun in sight, to finding
Speaker 1: the gun and throwing it in a lake, to being
Speaker 1: inside the apartment when his friend died. The problem with
Speaker 1: all three versions, none of them clearly lined up with
Speaker 1: the forensic evidence, and the interpretation of that evidence was
Speaker 1: heavily debated by both the prosecution and the defense. There
Speaker 1: was no confession, no eyewitness testimony. There was only this
Speaker 1: evidence in Gary Smith's word. And it's important to say
Speaker 1: here Gary Smith is white, Michael McQueen was black. Nine
Speaker 1: years of proceedings, in two separate appeals, Gary Smith finally
Speaker 1: entered what's known as an Alfred plea.
Speaker 13: An Alfred plea is essentially a guilty plea where you
Speaker 13: say that I'm not saying that I did it, but
Speaker 13: I acknowledge that there's a sufficient evidence in order to
Speaker 13: find me guilty.
Speaker 1: That's Max fris Loan, a defense attorney in Maryland and
Speaker 1: the founder of Friswood's Criminal Defense.
Speaker 13: So you have somebody who spent years in jail, the
Speaker 13: state has put on multiple criminal trials of pen numerous
Speaker 13: witnesses who have testified multiple times under oath, and so
Speaker 13: sort of the whole entire goal of an Alfred plea
Speaker 13: is that the person's found guilty, but the person themselves
Speaker 13: doesn't have to say it, but ultimately it is a conviction.
Speaker 1: An Alfred plea is a compromise. The state still gets
Speaker 1: a conviction, but the defendant gets the ability to maintain
Speaker 1: their innocence. Plus. As part of the plea, Gary's legal
Speaker 1: team negotiated his charges down significantly. What was once a
Speaker 1: murder charge was now reckless endangerment and he got sentenced
Speaker 1: to time served. In the end, Gary Smith served just
Speaker 1: six years behind bars. We reached out to Gary for comment,
Speaker 1: but he didn't respond to our call. The same goes
Speaker 1: from Michael McQueen's family. When Gary Smith was released, he
Speaker 1: also quickly got a job. He went to work for
Speaker 1: the very law firm that had defended him. He's even
Speaker 1: used in the firm's promotional materials.
Speaker 7: Hi, I'm Gary. I'm a law clerk here at the
Speaker 7: office of Jessega Moise.
Speaker 5: I served six years in prison.
Speaker 10: Before that, I was an army ranger.
Speaker 5: If you were a loved one who'd been charged with
Speaker 5: a crime, base get our office as a call and
Speaker 5: we'd love to help you.
Speaker 7: And now I'm happy to say that Gary works for
Speaker 7: me full time as a law clerk on all my
Speaker 7: homicide cases and my serious fellon cases.
Speaker 1: That's Andrew Jessick, Gary's boss, speaking on his firm's YouTube channel.
Speaker 7: I'm proud of him, and I think we were able
Speaker 7: to show in the end that Gary was innocent and
Speaker 7: that Gary deserved to get every break that he could.
Speaker 7: And now he's married, he's got a child, he's my lockerck,
Speaker 7: he's going to go to law school, and he's hopefully
Speaker 7: going to be my partner one day.
Speaker 1: If that boys sounds familiar, it's because you've heard it before.
Speaker 7: Every scene has.
Speaker 4: A past and every sinner has a future, and Mike.
Speaker 10: The great hearts of him will continue and dominate for
Speaker 10: the rest of his life.
Speaker 1: Andrew Jessick was also Mike levin Goood's defense attorney. He
Speaker 1: also didn't return our call. In many ways, Gary and
Speaker 1: Mike had a lot in comment. Both of their cases
Speaker 1: ended in a mess of legal technicalities, and they were
Speaker 1: both convicted, but they each maintained their innocence in spite
Speaker 1: of the judge's ruling. It's no wonder then that these
Speaker 1: two became partners, that they came together to help other
Speaker 1: people like them. On the Smith and Good site, they
Speaker 1: invite people to reach out and give them a call.
Speaker 10: So I called them up and surprisingly answered.
Speaker 1: By twenty twenty one, both Mike Levinood and Gary James
Speaker 1: Smith had served their sentences, and together they launched Smith
Speaker 1: and Good Associates, built on their experiences with and contacts
Speaker 1: within the criminal justice system. On the surface, their business
Speaker 1: is like any other consulting firm. They've got clean headshots
Speaker 1: and a polished website with a promise to help guide
Speaker 1: clients through a confusing system. But behind the branding there's
Speaker 1: a convicted rapist and a man convicted in connection with
Speaker 1: the death of his friend, and both are charging money
Speaker 1: to consult criminal defendants. We've confirmed through legal documents that
Speaker 1: the firm has been employed by Jessic and Moees, the
Speaker 1: criminal defense firm Mike and Gary both used. On one hand,
Speaker 1: all of this is perfectly legal. Gary and Mike serve
Speaker 1: their sentences and there's nothing stopping them from creating a
Speaker 1: business like this. In fact, in the eyes of the
Speaker 1: justice system, it might even be a good thing.
Speaker 13: At some point, you do have to earn enough money
Speaker 13: to comply with probation, right.
Speaker 1: That's Max frizz Alone, the lawyer you heard from earlier.
Speaker 1: He's referring to something we discussed at the top of
Speaker 1: the episode that X cons are required to hold down
Speaker 1: a job as part of the terms of their probation.
Speaker 13: For a lot of people who have been convicted of crimes,
Speaker 13: especially crimes of violence sexual offenses, traditional employment might be impossible.
Speaker 13: You know, you're unlikely to get through a background check
Speaker 13: if you have a prior violent felony, or you know
Speaker 13: you're a sex offender, so you might have to get
Speaker 13: creative about how to keep making money.
Speaker 1: And making money doesn't just benefit the offender, it benefits
Speaker 1: their families, who often suffer from the lack of income
Speaker 1: that comes with their relatives incarceration. But the idea that
Speaker 1: X cons are now profiting from that past raises a
Speaker 1: lot of moral, ethical, and legal questions.
Speaker 10: One of the pitfalls and problems with the industry is
Speaker 10: your qualification for the job is the fact that you
Speaker 10: committed a crime.
Speaker 1: That's Trey Morgan, one of my producers. He's been reporting
Speaker 1: on crime for eight years now and he did a
Speaker 1: lot of the investigation for this episode. One of the
Speaker 1: biggest problems he sees with this industry is that there's
Speaker 1: no certification process to become a prison consultant.
Speaker 10: I mean, almost every other industry that deals with our
Speaker 10: criminal justice system has some sort of licensing and some
Speaker 10: sort of board that establishes rules and guidelines, but for
Speaker 10: some reason we have decided that this one doesn't need oversight.
Speaker 1: A lot of these crimes are about control, and being
Speaker 1: a consultant puts you in a position of power. And
Speaker 1: then there's the concern of people like Mike getting close
Speaker 1: with fellow criminals. Remember started this business immediately after getting out.
Speaker 10: For sex offenders like Mike and violent offenders like Gary,
Speaker 10: the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services, they
Speaker 10: encourage limiting contact with other offenders, and the goal there
Speaker 10: is really I mean, it's common sense to reduce the
Speaker 10: risk of reoffending, especially right when you get out of
Speaker 10: jail or prison.
Speaker 1: Mike and Gary working together likely goes against that advice.
Speaker 1: So would Mike consulting other convicted felons while he was
Speaker 1: still on probation. Maybe there's a world where I could
Speaker 1: get past all of that. Mike and Gary did serve
Speaker 1: their time. They're technically free to do whatever they want
Speaker 1: to do and make money in most ways you could
Speaker 1: think of. But there's one thing I keep coming back to,
Speaker 1: what does this business mean for people like Michael McQueen
Speaker 1: and for Saskia. I talked to Trey about it. You know,
Speaker 1: I keep thinking about the fact that there's this entire
Speaker 1: industry built around helping criminal defendants, attending to their fears,
Speaker 1: their anxieties, their difficulties, when there's someone like Saskia who's
Speaker 1: spent years fighting to get the proper care she needs.
Speaker 1: I just feel like we spend so much energy caring
Speaker 1: for perpetrators of these crimes, and as a culture, we
Speaker 1: don't give the same safeguards to victims.
Speaker 10: I hate to say it, but in a lot of ways,
Speaker 10: we are an offender first society. Post conviction, our focus
Speaker 10: turned to the convicted to say, okay, well, they're serving
Speaker 10: their time, they're getting their life back together, and we
Speaker 10: start forgetting about the actual victim.
Speaker 1: When you go to Smith and Good's website, you see
Speaker 1: a lot about Mike and Gary's accolades home Mike was
Speaker 1: a business exec at Fortune five hundred companies, and how
Speaker 1: Gary was an intelligence specialist in Afghanistan. Nowhere on the
Speaker 1: website do they make any acknowledgment of the details of
Speaker 1: the crimes they've been convicted of and the victims whose
Speaker 1: lives they've altered forever.
Speaker 10: And I couldn't imagine what it would be like for
Speaker 10: Saskia to first learn that her perpetrator is selling the
Speaker 10: experience that he gained from what he did to her.
Speaker 10: I just can't imagine.
Speaker 1: Saskia had no idea about Like's business. She only found
Speaker 1: out about it from us once we started investigating for
Speaker 1: the podcast.
Speaker 9: I can't say that I was really surprised, but I
Speaker 9: just thought it was really a low, shameful.
Speaker 5: Thing to do.
Speaker 9: He's not helping victims or not helping rehabilitate people, and
Speaker 9: instead of making something good out of it, he decides
Speaker 9: to capitalize on it. He's like they laughing at everything
Speaker 9: that he put me through.
Speaker 1: As for Michael McQueen, he will never know what Gary
Speaker 1: went on to do. He was long dead by the
Speaker 1: time Smith and Good began. But those who loved McQueen,
Speaker 1: his family, his friends, those he served with overseas remain.
Speaker 1: As we said earlier, we tried contacting his mother for comment.
Speaker 1: She never replied to our messages. We do have audio
Speaker 1: from Gary's final sentencing hearing in twenty fifteen when McQueen's
Speaker 1: mother got up to give a victim impact statement, and
Speaker 1: we'd like to share what she had to say.
Speaker 2: There must be concerned for victims, And for my son,
Speaker 2: who under no reason was murdered and chilled by someone
Speaker 2: whom he considered a friend.
Speaker 7: Whether or not is called one.
Speaker 2: Thing, whether or not is called Ma's blood, it is
Speaker 2: still murder. He chilled an innocent young man who had
Speaker 2: everything to look forward to. And so I asked myself,
Speaker 2: where is the fairness for my son? Where's the fairness
Speaker 2: for him?
Speaker 1: Mike and Gary get to move on. Victims live with
Speaker 1: these crimes forever.
Speaker 9: I'll never be the same. I'll never be able to
Speaker 9: assume that because I'm a good person that I'll get
Speaker 9: treated as one.
Speaker 1: It would be one thing for Mike to start a
Speaker 1: business like this if he'd made amends with Saskia.
Speaker 9: If he would have said, I'm a sex addict and
Speaker 9: I will do anything I can to show you that
Speaker 9: I'm sorry, If he would have done anything in good.
Speaker 1: Faith, then maybe Saskio would feel differently about all of it.
Speaker 1: But if his actions in the divorce trial are any indication,
Speaker 1: Mike's not trying to minimize harm.
Speaker 9: There was no regret, no accountability taken immediately right away.
Speaker 9: The only thing he cared about was saving his face.
Speaker 1: This question of accountability is one that comes up in
Speaker 1: many of our stories, but it's rare that we have
Speaker 1: a case where the perpetrator has built a career around
Speaker 1: his conviction and incarceration, which is one of the reasons
Speaker 1: we wanted a call Mike to ask him about this ourselves.
Speaker 1: So Trey rang them.
Speaker 10: Up and surprisingly he answered, I don't know what I
Speaker 10: imagined after listening to all the court audio and all
Speaker 10: of that, but he just sounded like a normal guy.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 10: I introduced myself. I'm Trey, I'm a producer. We're doing
Speaker 10: a story about Taskia Inwood and wanted to talk to
Speaker 10: you about your business. And he paused for a.
Speaker 1: Second, and then Mike started asking Trey questions, questions like,
Speaker 1: so you're a reporter, what's the angle of the story?
Speaker 10: And then he said something to the effect of, what
Speaker 10: does my business have to do with my personal life?
Speaker 10: What does my business have to do with Saskia. His
Speaker 10: business is a result of serving time, and he served
Speaker 10: that time because of his relationship to Saskia.
Speaker 1: Trey laid this out for Mike, but at this point
Speaker 1: Mike was done talking. He said he didn't want to
Speaker 1: comment on his business, his criminal trial, or his divorce. Case,
Speaker 1: so they ended the call. Afterwards, Trey sat there frozen
Speaker 1: for a while, processing Mike's questions, what's the story here?
Speaker 1: What do his crimes his personal life have to do
Speaker 1: with his business?
Speaker 10: When he said that, I was caught off guard, like,
Speaker 10: how do you answer that?
Speaker 1: On the final episode Betrayal Season five, we turned back
Speaker 1: to Saskia and her healing journey.
Speaker 9: I don't think that I can ever trust anybody. I
Speaker 9: don't think that I could ever fully be confident that
Speaker 9: someone wasn't misleading me or manipulating me because I was
Speaker 9: so sure that he was a good person and that
Speaker 9: you love me. How can I ever get to the
Speaker 9: point where I truly don't fear that.
Speaker 1: For resources on sexual violence, visit RAIN dot org slash
Speaker 1: betray That's our ai n N dot org slash betrayal.
Speaker 1: You can also get free confidential twenty four seven support
Speaker 1: through Rain's National Sexual Assault Hotline. Just text Hope to
Speaker 1: six four six seven three or call one eight hundred
Speaker 1: sixty five six hope. You are not alone. If you
Speaker 1: would like to reach out to the Betrayal team or
Speaker 1: want to tell us your story, email us at betrayalpod
Speaker 1: at gmail dot com. That is Betrayal Pod at gmail
Speaker 1: dot com or follow us on Instagram at Betrayal Pod.
Speaker 1: To access additional content and to connect with the Betrayal community,
Speaker 1: join our substack at Betrayal dot substack dot com. We're
Speaker 1: grateful for your support. One way to show support is
Speaker 1: by subscribing to our show on Apple Podcasts. Don't forget
Speaker 1: to rate and review Betrayal five star reviews go a
Speaker 1: long way. A big thank you to all of our listeners.
Speaker 1: Betrayal is the production of Glass Podcasts, a division of
Speaker 1: Glass Entertainment Group in partnership with iHeart Podcasts. The show
Speaker 1: is executive produced by Nancy Glass and Jennifer Fason, hosted
Speaker 1: and produced by me Andrea Gunning, written and produced by
Speaker 1: Trey Morgan and Caitlin Golden. Our supervising producer is Carrie Hartman.
Speaker 1: Our story editor is Monique le Board. Also produced by
Speaker 1: Ben Fetterman. Associate producers are Olivia Hewitt and Leah Jablow.
Speaker 1: Production management by Kristin Melcyrie. Additional support by Curry Richmond.
Speaker 1: Voice acting by Stephanie Young and Tanner Robbins. Our iHeart
Speaker 1: team is Ali Perry and Jessica Crincheck. Audio editing by
Speaker 1: Tanner Robbins, with additional editing and mixing by Matt Delvecchio.
Speaker 1: Special thanks to Saskia, her friends and family, and special
Speaker 1: thanks to Will Pearson and Carrie Lieberman. Betrayal's theme is
Speaker 1: composed by Oliver Bains Music library provided by Mob Music
Speaker 1: and For more podcasts from iHeart, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts